Caregiver-infant interactions and the stages of attachment

• Define attachment


  ->an affectionate tie that one person or animal forms between himself and another specific one

  ->a tie that binds them together in space and endures over time
• what is the behavioural hallmark of attachment?

  ->seeking to gain and maintain a certain degree of proximity to the object of attachment

  ->attachment behaviours aim to maintain proximity or contact e.g following, clinging and signalling behaviours like smiling, crying and calling
• what is the main importance of developing an attachment?

  ->for survival and to develop trust for others and learn how to respond to people
• define reciprocity


  ->an interaction is reciprocal when each person responds to the other and elicits a response from them

  ->from around three months, this interaction tends to be increasingly frequent and involves attention to each other's verbal signs and facial expressions (Feldman 2007)
• Feldman and Eidelman, 2007- case study

  ->from birth, babies and their mothers (or other carers) spend a lot of time in intense and pleasurable interaction

  ->babies have periodic 'alert phases' and signal that they are ready for interaction

  ->mothers typically pick up on and respond to infant alertness around two-thirds of the time
• Define interactional synchrony 


  ->two people are said to be 'synchronised' when they carry out the same action simultaneously

  ->interactional synchrony can be defined as the 'temporal co-ordination' of micro-level social behaviour'

  ->it takes place when mother and infant interact in such a way that their actions and emotions mirror the other

  ->infants have their bodies in tune with the rhythm of carers' spoken language to create a kind of turn-taking, as seen with two-way vocal conversations

  ->this serves to reinforce the attachment bond
• describe Meltzoff and Moore (1977) procedure and results

  ->they observed the beginning of interactional synchrony (IS) in infants as young as age 2

  ->adult model was used & displayed one of the three facial expressions or hand movements

  ->the dummy was placed in the infant's mouth during the initial display to prevent any response

  ->after the display, the dummy was removed & the child expression was filmed-they found that the infant mirrored the actions of the adult all the time
• what is a strength of the research done into caregiver-infant interactions?

  ->one strength is that the caregiver-interactions are usually filmed in a laboratory

  ->this means that any other activity that might distract a baby is controlled

  ->it also means that observations can be recorded and analysed later

  ->therefore; it's unlikely that researchers will miss seeing key behaviours
• why is the fact that these interactions being filmed in a laboratory a strength?

  the data collected in such research should have good reliability and validity
• what is a limitation of this research done into caregiver-infant interactions?

  ->a limitation is that it's hard to interprete a baby's interaction

  ->young babies lack co-ordination and much of their bodies are almost immobile

  ->the movements being observed are small hand movements or subtle changes in expression

  ->it's also hard to determine what's taking place from a baby's perspective
• why is this a limitation of the research done into caregiver-infant interactions?

  ->the inability to interprete babies interactions means we cannot be certain that the behaviours seen in caregiver-infant interactions have a special meaning